


just a little bit

by 3stir



Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Alternate Universe - Supernatural Elements, First Kiss, Fluff, Ghost Stories, I'm super late though sorry, Kenhina week 2019, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-29
Updated: 2019-05-29
Packaged: 2020-03-26 14:57:20
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,210
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19008118
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/3stir/pseuds/3stir
Summary: After running from a test of courage on the seedier side of town, Shoyo finds himself back on familiar tarmac, looking up at the yawning specter that he calls a friend. It's kind of weird... Shoyo is absolutely terrified of ghosts, but Kenma is different. Kenma is just... Kenma.





	just a little bit

Before he fully realizes what’s happening, he’s running.

His sneakers pound against the streets in time with his racing heartbeat. Cool summer night air breezes past him in a blur, barely teasing his loose gym shorts and thin tshirt as he races on. His eyes only open when his mental map gets fuzzy, but otherwise he keeps them scrunched closed beneath furrowed brows. Head ducked low, arms pumping, he sprints as hard as he can, as far away as he can. His few breaths are gasping and ragged between his chapped lips. He doesn’t have an extra thought to spare for the sweat beading at his hairline.

He just needs to get away. Now.

“Hinata, wait!” he barely hears echoing through the empty streets. He doesn’t wait, can’t wait, with his heart threatening to erupt so painfully from behind his burning lungs. There’s a stray thought in the back of his mind that his team won’t let him live this down, will tease him relentlessly about this come practice on Monday, but he pushes it away at the next block. As the fear slowly fades, as his pulse stutters into something more anxious than scared, he redoubles his pace.

No one follows him. No creepy dead  _ apparition _ follows him, either. It’s just Shoyo, his footfalls, and the occasional, distant sound of a dog barking. When he finally slows to a stop, he looks up toward the full harvest moon, eerily big and bright in the midnight sky.

He stands on the small basketball court near his home, panting burning breaths through his body that barely ease the feeling that he’s suffocating. He heaves a groan at the realization that he’s instinctively run  _ here _ , in the middle of the night, where he knows he’ll probably run into—

“Shoyo?”

He doesn’t try to hide his flinch, his nerves still a bit shot from earlier. Glancing up, his eyes easily find the figure reclining along a sturdy tree branch just over the chain-link fence. Kenma is vaguely static at his edges. His outlines glow slightly in the light of the moon. Sharp, catlike features are illuminated by the 3DS in his hand, as usual. He regards Shoyo curiously, but not in the way that makes his guts twist with anxiety and the desperate need to pee. Instead, Kenma always seems to draw Shoyo in further, closer, like the heat from a lit stove on a cold winter night.

Kenma blinks out of their unintentional staring contest owlishly. Before Shoyo can fully catch his ragged breath, Kenma slips from his spot in the tree. His descent to the blacktop is slow, like fresh-fallen snow. He looks up when his feet firmly settle against the ground, tucking the 3DS into his pocket in the same easy motion. His bright golden eyes flit over Shoyo from head to toe this time, trying to figure out this mystery for himself.

“I thought you were busy with your teammates tonight? It’s the supermoon,” he mumbles, half to himself.

Shoyo immediately scratches at the back of his neck, suddenly overcome with the weight of Kenma’s stare, “I was with them, yeah. D-decided it wasn’t worth my time, their dumb test of courage.”

“Test of courage?” Kenma parrots, tilting his head to the side as his face scrunches together. “Then you should have brought them here. Scaring them might be fun.”

A wicked smile grows along Kenma’s lips, and the sight makes Shoyo snort with a burst of unexpected laughter. It should be ominous and creepy, but the fact that it’s Kenma tickles something deep inside Shoyo.

“You’d think it was too much work, dummy,” he says through his own wide smile.

Kenma’s expression calms into something Shoyo can’t really read, something fond and… full. Bright.

“That’s true,” Kenma says easily, turning to walk toward one of the basketball hoops, “but you can’t deny that it would be really funny to tell them something stupid like there’s a malevolent spirit haunting this court, who only appears during the full moon…”

“That’s not stupid,” Shoyo interjects before he can stop himself.

Kenma turns back toward Shoyo hastily and blinks harshly against the quiet midnight air. His surprise is easy for Shoyo to spot, even as the simmering mirth falls away. Shoyo doesn’t relent, doesn’t back down. If warmth grows to color his face anew in swatches of blotchy pinks and reds, it doesn’t mean a single thing.

His bright gaze remains focused and steady on Kenma, waiting quietly until Kenma walks back to stand in front of Shoyo with that same strange emotion in his eyes.

Finally, Kenma relents. “Maybe  _ stupid _ was the wrong word. Sorry. I just wish…”

The rest of his thought trails off, but somewhere deep down, Shoyo kind of understands. It’s not really something he can put into words, either— wouldn’t be, even if he wasn’t notoriously terrible at being voracious and well-spoken in the first place— but he gets it. He feels that same pull against his lungs, that same burning feeling whenever he has to leave Kenma here, alone, for another week or so.

A thought strikes him suddenly, ripping hope alight into his demeanor all at one.

“We’re making this work, though! I can still see you as long as the moon is bright, and that’s all that matters to me. Not that you’re part of the night sometimes, but the fact that you’re here other times.”

He holds his hands out to Kenma, palm up, because it feels like the right thing to do. The moon is full and strong tonight, so they should be able to touch. He should be able to feel the ice cold static of Kenma’s form, the same buzzing against his skin that it was last month when Shoyo shoved Kenma’s shoulder for making a particularly bad pun.

So he waits with bated breath for Kenma to consider his assertion, for Kenma to relent to Shoyo’s determination and trust him with this… whatever this is. With a soft smile and a half-held back chuckle, Kenma gives in, like he always does. He lifts his hands and carefully, cautiously, places them in Shoyo’s.

They’re warm.

They both startle slightly at the realization, at the strange spark flickering between their hands, but Shoyo instinctively holds fast to Kenma’s hands when Kenma tries to pull away. His breath catches in his throat as he watches Kenma’s cheekbones darken, as those wavering but  _ warm _ hands finally return his grip.

“All that matters is that I’m here now, huh?” Kenma whispers.

“Y-yeah. That’s what I think, anyway,” Shoyo smiles sheepishly, his pulse spiking and thumping in his wrists.

He doesn’t expect Kenma to step even closer, to pull their joined hands to a strangely warmed chest.

“T-then I’m glad you’re here too, Shoyo.”

For a spectre, for a boy who has been dead and haunting for so long, he’s so impossibly warm here, under the light of the supermoon. The feeling sets pinpricks ablaze in Shoyo’s entire body. He itches, distinctly in his ribs and lungs and  _ heart _ , for more.

When he leans his head forward a little, Kenma reciprocates. When Shoyo tugs him closer, Kenma goes easily.

When they kiss, gently and fearfully, they both end up smiling. Just a little bit.

**Author's Note:**

> I know I'm super late for KenHina Week but... I _had_ to write at least one little thing. Because I love them. And they need more cute AUs. And I need to read more recommendations.
> 
> Catch me at [tumblr](https://3stir.tumblr.com) if you need anything or want to see what I'm up to.


End file.
